this post was submitted on 21 Feb 2026
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Privacy
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I installed GOS on an old Pixel 4a I had lying around. It seemed OK so far, but I didn't do a lot of testing. Are you running it with sandboxed play services? How well does that work as compared to MicroG under CalyxOS?
Not using any play services or g-mail. I use busybusy for work, it says I need the play service but it works without it. My credit Union app works fine. I never got into using my phone to pay, so haven't tried that.
I don't need payments to work, I've never used Gmail, and most of my apps are FOSS ones off FDroid. But banking apps must work, and so do push notifications. The latter are my biggest issue: afaik, they run through GCM (part of Play Services), and you won't get any unless an app has implemented an alternative listener (Signal does), which comes with more battery power draw. (How) do push notifications work for you without microG and Play Services?
I dislike notifications so have them pretty much turned off.
Wow, thanks for the detailed answer! I've heard of ntfy, even considered running it in order to get notifications from my server. I guess you've given me new incentive to look into it more!